Most people would be asking ‘why me’ after being hit by three life-threatening illnesses.

Not Susan van Riel.

The Hamilton Parish resident was diagnosed with rheumatic fever at 13, failing heart valves at 41 and, at 58, chronic lymphocytic leukaemia.

“I have had my black Mondays,” the 61-year-old said. “But ultimately, I think I’m almost glad I’ve had my health challenges, because they’ve given me a greater appreciation for life.

“I think I’m a lot calmer than other people. It puts things in perspective.”

Her 28-year-old daughter Helen van Riel is running the Boston Marathon on April 17. The biology teacher has raised more than $6,000 in her mother’s name so far.

The funds will be given to Massachusetts General Hospital, where she had heart surgery and was treated for cancer.

British-born Mrs van Riel met her Dutch husband Boy van Riel while working at the old Sonesta Beach Hotel in 1986.

“I worked on the front desk and he was assistant financial controller,” Mrs van Riel said.

Six months after they started dating, her husband received a promotion. They both moved to Amsterdam, and then Boston. The couple married in Bermuda, on August 19, 1987. In addition to Helen, they have a second daughter, Grace.

“We loved Bermuda and would have stayed if he hadn’t been promoted,” she said.

In 1994, a required medical exam for a green card turned up a heart murmur. Doctors attributed it to the rheumatic fever she had as a teenager.

“I was really surprised,” said Mrs van Riel. “I had no symptoms. No one ever told me that rheumatic fever can have a long-term impact on your heart in middle age. As a child, I was in the hospital with rheumatic fever for two months and had a long recovery from it. I thought when I got better, I was done with it.”

Doctors monitored her heart for several years, before replacing two of her valves with mechanical ones when she was 47.

“When I came out of ICU, I was lying there and I could hear ticking,” said Mrs van Riel. “I don’t like a clock ticking in the bedroom.

“I said what is that? The doctor explained that was me. I said, ‘I’m going to go crazy’. It would be like Chinese torture.”

In the years since, she has adjusted.

The valves are a good barometer for her mood, since they tick faster when she’s excited.

When she reads at night they quieten. When she watches the Patriots, her favourite football team, the whole family can hear her heart.

“Especially when the Patriots are winning,” laughed Mrs van Riel.

In 2013, her health took another hit. She was sent to hospital with pneumonia.

“A blood test revealed my white blood cell count was sky high,” said Mrs van Riel. Further testing turned up her cancer.

Chronic lymphocytic leukaemia is a type of cancer that starts from white blood cells in the bone marrow. It mainly affects older adults, and accounts for about one-third of all leukaemia.

“It had weakened my immune system which is why I developed pneumonia,” she said.

Cancer treatment did not go well. She had a severe reaction to chemotherapy and developed a life-threatening infection.

After she recovered, her doctor decided that she’d had enough.

“He said they’d just monitor my blood levels,” she said.

The couple returned to Bermuda in 2014 so Mr van Riel could take up the financial controller position at Rosewood Tucker’s Point.

In 2015, she was asked to return to chemo after another health setback. She takes the medicine in capsule form.

“I take one pill a day,” she said. “It doesn’t have the side-effects of the first chemo I took.”

Her husband’s busy work schedule will prevent her from seeing her daughter run the marathon, but she was thrilled to watch her last year when she did it for the first time.

“Last year, she ran for Cops for Children with Cancer,” said Mrs van Riel. “She was hoping to make it in under five hours, but didn’t quite manage it. She lost time because we had so many friends spread out along the way that she had to keep stopping to hug people.”

Mrs van Riel volunteers one day a week at Second Hand Rose in St George’s.

“I am also a member of the International Women’s Club,” she said.

“They have a crochet group called the Happy Hookers. I joined.

“I am not the best pupil, but we have fun getting together.”

•Visit here to donate: https://www.crowdrise.com/mgherresponseteamboston2017/fundraiser/helenvanriel